| Berlin,
August 27 and 28, 2004 |
At
the invitation of the Verband der Historiker und
Historikerinnen Deutschlands, the Bureau held a
meeting in Berlin on August 27 and 28 at the Wissenschaftszentrum
Berlin für Sozialforschung.
Present: Jürgen Kocka, President;
Eva Österberg, Vice-president; Jean-Claude Robert,
Secretary General; Pierre Ducrey, Treasurer; Catherine
Coquery-Vidrovitch, Koichi Kabayama, José Luis
Peset, Gregory Bongard-Levin and Michael Heyd, Assessor
Members, Ivan T. Berend, Counselor.
Invited
guests: Martyn Lyons, President of the Organizing
Committee of the XXth Congress (Sydney, 2005), Even
Lange, President of the Organizing Committee of the
XIXth Congress (Oslo).
Excused: Romila Thapar, Vice-President,
William C. Jordan, Assessor Member.
Ms.
Gunilla Budde acted as recorder.
Symposium
The
meeting of the Bureau was preceded by a symposium on
the theme of “Division, Reunification and German
Historians.”
In
keeping with custom, the Bureau asked the organizer
of the Berlin meeting to plan a scientific discussion
for the meeting. The program featured four presentations
by young historians, followed by a general commentary.
ICHS President Jürgen Kocka made the introductions.
-
Martin
Sabow, (Potsdam), “German Historiography
Between Division and Re-unification”
-
Matthias
Middel, (Leipzig), “Has Unification
of German Historiographies Been a Success?”
-
Simone
Lässig, (Dresden/Washington), “Historical
Profession and Unification in Germany. Personal Views
from the Academic Province”
-
Arnd
Bauerkämper, (Berlin), “Land Reform
and Collectivization in the Soviet Zone of Occupation
and the DDR. Historiography in Germany Before and
After 1989/90. Political Debates and Personal Recollections”
-
Helga
Schultz (Frankfurt an der Oder), Commentary
The
presentations looked at various perspectives of the
impact of reunification on the scientific community
and on German historiography. A lively discussion ensued.
Agenda:
1. President’s opening remarks
2. ICHS affairs and Secretary General's report
3. Motion to amend the statutes of the ICHS.
4.
Treasurer’s report
5. Preparations for the XXth ICHS Congress in Sydney
6. ICHS-UNESCO relations
7. Next Bureau meeting
8. Miscellaneous
1.
President's opening statement and remarks
The President welcomed Bureau members and, on their
behalf, thanked the German National Committee for their
hospitality in Berlin, and particularly Professor Manfred
Hildermeier, President of the Committee. He then spoke
of the death by accident of Wolfgang Mommsen in August.
In addition to being an eminent professional, Professor
Mommsen played a vital role in ICHS activities, first
by assuming the Presidency of the German National Committee
and acting on several occasions as a delegate to the
General assembly of the ICHS, then by becoming a member
of the Nominating Committee (1997-2000), and lastly,
by working as a collaborator on the English edition
of Karl Dietrich Erdmann’s book on the history
of the ICHS.
The President announced the major topics of the meeting,
particularly the organization of the Sydney Congress
and the need to specify the selection criteria for future
Bureau members. He underscored the ICHS’s principal
contributions, particularly the organization of regional
conferences between 2002 and 2004. He thanked Bureau
members for their contributions and contrasted the ICHS’s
increased activities with the relative contraction of
its financial resources.
The floor was then given to Jean-Claude Robert.
2. ICHS affairs and Secretary General’s
report
Preparing the Sydney Congress, the Bulletin and organizing
regional conferences under the aegis of the joint UNESCO-ICHS
Committee has taken up most of the Secretary General’s
time since September 2003.
The Secretariat is now off and running in Montreal,
and the archives with dates prior to 2000 have been
turned over to the national archives of France, located
in Paris. Mr. Robert explained that he would be working
on the three main concerns of his predecessor, i.e.
revitalizing, rejuvenating and expanding the ICHS.
Bulletin
The Bulletin has undergone some slight changes. Like
last year, 700 copies were published, and the copies
were mailed on December 12. This particular issue featured
a reprint of an article by Michel François, ICHS
Secretary General from 1950 to 1980, recounting the
first 50 years of the ICHS. The article was first published
in volume 10 (1974-1976) of the Bulletin. The ICHS website
has been only partially updated; more specifically,
only the list of organizers and discussants of the Sydney
Congress has been updated. The entire website should
be completely updated to coincide with the mailing of
the next Bulletin (vol. 30-2004).
2.2
Members
Our
membership numbers remain relatively stable, however,
some Latin American countries are experiencing financial
and organizational difficulties. The Tunisian National
Committee has re-staffed its Bureau and the Secretary
General motioned that the Bureau approve the renewal
of its Bureau (motion approved). The International Numismatic
Commission has withdrawn and no longer wishes to belong
to the ICHS.
2.3
Secretariat
The
Secretariat had to be re-organized in the wake of Sylvie
Freney’s departure. A part-time professional secretary
was hired in July 2004. Some of the Secretary General’s
time will be freed up in the fall of 2005, thanks to
his institution, the Université du Québec
à Montréal, but a staff shortage is still
likely to be a recurring problem. A minimum of $25,000
would have to be released every five years to help the
Secretariat cope with specific needs.
Bureau
members were reluctant to increase dues, preferring
other avenues such as reducing certain expenses and
finding new sources of revenue. To reduce expenses it
might be possible to eliminate one Bureau meeting, the
one normally held the year preceding the quinquennial
Congress. On the same subject, the Bureau questioned
the need for former presidents to be ex officio members
of the Bureau for a period of 10 years following the
end of their mandate. A period of five years would seem
sufficient, provided that the Bureau could invite a
former president as a Counselor when required. All the
members approved this motion, and an amendment to the
constitution is presented further on. The frequency
of the Bulletin might be reconsidered, but most Bureau
members were in favour of keeping it on an annual basis.
Lastly, it may be possible to combine a Bureau meeting
with a scientific symposium in which all members would
participate, but one of the Bureau members would have
to assume the responsibility of preparing funding requests
to finance the symposium. In fact, if the ICHS were
no longer required to finance one Bureau meeting every
five years, the amount saved would be enough to cover
the Secretariat’s basic needs. These thoughts
will be conveyed to the next Bureau, which will be elected
in 2005. The new members will then take the final decision.
In
closing, the Secretary General recognized the support
of Sylvie Freney since the fall of 2001, and that of
his institution, the UQAM, and thanked them both.
3.
Motion to amend the ICSH’s Constitution
3.1
Article 1
During the Bureau meeting in Paris (2003), a motion
was presented to amend the wording of the 1st article
of the Constitution in order to clarify the meaning
of the last sentence.
The
text currently reads as follows:
“It
shall defend freedom of thought and expression in the
field of historical research and ensure the respect
of professional ethical standards among its members.”
The
following wording was proposed:
“It
shall defend freedom of thought and expression in the
field of historical research and teaching, and is opposed
to the misuse of history and shall use every means at
its disposal to ensure the ethical professional conduct
of its members.”
The
advantage of this wording is that it spells out the
ICHS’s position with regard to those who try to
use history for political ends.
3.2 Article 5
The third paragraph of article 5 should be amended to
reflect a change in the amount of time a past President
is considered an ex officio member.
Currently,
the article reads as follows:
"Past
Presidents of the ICHS shall also be members of the
Board, as Counselor-Members without vote, for a period
of ten years after their presidential office without
consideration of age. Following the end of the ten-year
period, Past Presidents shall be deemed Honorary Counselors."
The
following wording was proposed:
"The
past President of the ICHS shall also be a member of
the Board, as a Counselor-Member without vote, for a
period of five years after his or her presidential office
without consideration of age."
Both
amendments will be presented to the next ICHS General
Assembly.
4.
Treasurer’s Report
The
Treasurer distributed the following documents to the
members of the Bureau:
The
2003 profit and loss account shows inflows of CHF 53,209.90
and expenses of CHF 64,036.80; the result is a negative
balance of CHF 10,827.40. This amount includes an initial
contribution of CHF 15,000 for the 2005 Sydney Congress.
Two other identical provisions will follow.
Some
ICHS members do not regularly pay their membership dues,
and sometimes they are extremely late in settling their
accounts. Countries with late accounts will be approached
before the 2005 General Assembly in Sydney and reminded,
among other things, of article 7 of the Constitution,
which reads: “Every National Committee or International
Affiliated Organization that has not paid its dues for
three years shall lose its right to vote. After five years,
that National Committee or International Affiliated Organization
shall be deemed to have withdrawn de facto.”
5.
Preparation of the XXth ICHS Congress in Sydney
5.1
Report of the President of the Australian Organizing Committee
Martin Lyons presented his report on the preparations
for the Sydney Congress. The Organizing Committee determined
that in order to avoid a deficit by the end of the Congress,
1,400 registrations were needed to reach the break-even
point. The second registration brochure should be ready
by October 1, 2004, and published as soon as possible
after that date. The brochure would contain a detailed
program of the Congress as well as tourism and hotel information.
The following deadlines were set for the Proceedings:
March 7, 2005, receipt of texts; April 11, receipt of
manuscripts by the Organizing Committee; May 11, finalization
of Proceedings; May 23, Printing; June 13, Delivery. The
Congress web site at www.cishsydney2005.org is continually
updated and contains the registration form as well as
information on the Congress. The Committee has received
a great many requests for financial assistance to attend
the Congress (52 in all), which have been examined by
a committee. The Secretary General is being kept abreast
of the events. It will be necessary for the Solidarity
Fund to receive the subsidies from the ICHS (CHF 45,000)
and UNESCO-ICPHS ($5,000) as soon as possible. Furthermore,
fund-raising efforts in the private sector have not yielded
the results expected. Lastly, very few editors have shown
an interest in renting a stand for the book expo.
5.2
Recruitment of organizers, discussants and communicators:
update on the sessions
The work took longer than expected and many messages were
sent back and forth. Many organizers said that they had
difficulty recruiting communicators because of the distance.
Difficulties in abiding by some directives were noted,
so the Secretary General had to be assertive with some
organizers who tended to limit their selection of communicators
from among their own countries. Most of the sessions are
fully staffed, however. A few problem cases still remain:
the organizer of major sub-theme 1c, “Natural Sciences,
History and the Image of Humankind,” withdrew late
in the preparation period, so the title and structure
of the session had to be changed slightly. The sub-theme
will be presented in a round-table fashion. It was organized
by Verena Winiwarter, the theme coordinator, and will
be entitled “Natural Sciences and History.”
Three other sessions are not finalized, but should be
organized by the end of September.
5.3
Sessions by International Affiliated Organizations and
Internal Commissions
Twenty-one International Affiliated Organizations and
four Internal Commissions expressed their willingness
to hold their meetings in Sydney. We have received programs
from 17 of these organizations, which will be published
in October in the next registration brochure for the Sydney
Congress. The other programs will be posted on the Congress
website as they become available. As was requested by
the General Assembly in Amsterdam, we will strive to schedule
the sessions of the Organizations and Commissions over
the last four days of the Congress, but since most of
the Organizations and Commissions have asked that their
three half-days remain consecutive, we are left with very
little maneuvering space. The integration of IAO and IC
programs within the Sydney program will be greater this
time.
5.4
Opening and closing sessions
The opening session will be led by a panel that will discuss
the theme of “The Internationalization of the Historical
Discipline.” Natalie Zemon Davis and Jürgen
Kocka will each make a presentation, which will be followed
by commentaries by Romila Thapar, Donald Denoon and Ibrahima
Thioub. Thomas Kenneally, the keynote speaker for the
closing ceremony, will discuss the relationship between
historians and the representation of history in the media.
Bureau
members requested a third gathering, which would be much
less formal and open to all participants, to be held mid-week.
Martyn Lyons will check if it would be possible to hold
such an event.
5.5
Special sessions
5.5.1 Joint UNESCO-ICHS Committee sessions
Thanks to funding from UNESCO, the Joint Committee plans
to organize five workshops in Sydney patterned after the
sessions held in Oslo. In addition, the Joint Committee
will finance Specialized Theme 1 on the history of Africa.
The workshops are the outcome of regional conferences
that were held between 2002 and 2004, and which will be
discussed in section 6. Moreover, the success of the international
conference in Beijing last April was pointed out. The
forum was organized by the ICHS President under the sponsorship
of the Volkswagen Foundation and was entitled “The
Course of Modernization in the Countries and Regions of
East Asia.” Bureau members were pleased with the
holding of such conferences between Congresses and wholeheartedly
approved the plan to present the outcome of such meetings
during the Sydney Congress.
The
following is the list of workshops on the program:
| UNESCO1. |
The
Place of Central Europe between East and West |
| UNESCO2. |
Transformations
in the Arab and Moslem World |
| UNESCO3. |
Latin
America: Democracy and the New Political History |
| UNESCO4. |
History
of the Modernity Reconsidered: East Asian Paths and
Patterns |
| UNESCO5. |
The
Caribbean: Multiculturalism and Diasporas |
Africa
being already on the main programme, no workshop is
organized.
The
Secretary General intends to add a plenary session to
these workshops as a way to get many participants together
to discuss the theme of the transformation of the profession
of historian in the wake of the internationalization
of the discipline. The organization of this session
is contingent on obtaining adequate additional funding.
5.5.2
Presentation of the translation of Karl Dietrich Erdmann’s
book
Jürgen Kocka presented an update on the translation
of Karl Dietrich Erdmann’s book on the history
of the International Congresses and the ICHS. He underlined
the scope of the work accomplished by the late Wolfgang
Mommsen, who wrote the final chapter as an epilogue
covering the 1985-2000 period. The title and bibliographical
notice of the book are as follows: Towards a Global
Community of Historians. The International Historical
Congresses and the International Committee of Historical
Sciences 1898-2000, by Karl Dietrich Erdmann, edited
by Jürgen Kocka and Wolfgang Mommsen†, in
collaboration with Agnes Blänsdorf, translated
by Alan Nothnagle. Published by Berghahn Books, New
York and Oxford, 2005.
The
ICSH has made a commitment with the editor to purchase
about 100 copies. Each National Committee and International
Affiliated Organization will be given one copy. The
book is scheduled to be launched during the Sydney Congress.
It was motioned that a short session be organized at
the end of one of the days during which Jürgen
Kocka and some former Bureau members could present the
book. The Australian Committee will look after inserting
an advertising leaflet in the packets of attendees.
6. ICHS-UNESCO relations
6.1
ICPHS
The ICPHS will be holding its next General Assembly
in Beijing in November 2004. The Secretary General will
be in attendance, as is customary. The meeting promises
to be interesting because there will be a joint meeting
of the two organizations with links to UNESCO, namely
Philosophy and Humanistic Studies and Social Sciences.
This would be the occasion to establish contacts with
the organizations and with the Chinese National Committee,
which will be attending the meeting. The ICHS has obtained
a grant of $5,000 to help cover the travel expenses
of colleagues from developing nations who will be attending
the Congress.
6.2
Joint UNESCO-ICHS Committee
One of the most important aspects of the work of the
Joint Committee was the organization of regional conferences.
The regional conferences have all fulfilled their goals
and not only explored the various themes but also enhanced
awareness of the need to establish networks of historians
and foster a comparative approach in history. For the
ICHS, the conferences are productive in acquainting
others with our initiatives and goals.
6.2.1
Regional symposiums: Lublin, Mexico, Rabat
LUBLIN: The first conference was held in Lublin, Poland,
on November 14 and 15, 2003, on the theme of “The
Place of Central Europe between East and West during
the 1000-2000 Millennium.” There were approximately
30 presentations on related topics. The meeting was
organized by the Institute of East Central Europe and
held at the Hotel Unia Lublin. The first day’s
debates were held in Polish, and the second day’s,
in French and English. The Secretary General spoke during
the closing session.
MEXICO
CITY: The second regional conference was held at El
Colegio de México from November 26-28, 2003,
under the theme “Los caminos de la democracia
en América Latina: revision y balance de la 'nueva
historia politica'.” About 30 Latin American historians
discussed various aspects of the theme and the current
evolution of Latin American historiography. Attendance
stood at about 60 participants, including students from
the university. This conference was organized by Jose
Luis Peset, Bureau member, and Guillermo Palacios of
the Colegio de México. The Secretary General
took part in each session and addressed the assembly
during the opening and closing sessions.
RABAT:
The third regional conference was held in Rabat from
December 11 to 13, 2003, under the theme “Reforms
and changes in the Arab Muslim world.” More than
a dozen historians from eight Arab nations were in attendance.
The conference was held at the Université Mohammed
V, with the support of the Association marocaine pour
la recherche historique. The conference greatly benefited
from the skills of Chantal Chanson-Jabeur of the SEDET
laboratory of the Université de Paris-7-Denis-Direrot.
Discussions focussed on four previously identified themes:
“Regional space, territories and mobility,”
“Reforms, institutions, State,” “Education,
culture, religion,” and “Cities and urbanization.”
The Secretary General attended each session, and spoke
at the opening session to introduce the ICHS and its
core mission. The sessions were attended by many students.
6.2.2
Joint Committee: Report of the meeting of November 16,
2003
The Joint Committee held its annual meeting in Lublin
on November 16, 2003. The ICHS was represented by Professor
Jerzy Kloczowski, Chairman of the Joint Committee, Professor
Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch, and the Secretary General.
UNESCO was represented by Jérôme Bindé,
Deputy Assistant Director-General for Social and Human
Sciences. Ms. Iwona Goral of the Institute of East Central
Europe acted as secretary, and Hubert Laszkiewicz, Assistant
Director of the Institute, attended as an observer.
Given
that the Joint Committee has changed sectors at UNESCO,
passing from the Culture sector to Social and Human
Sciences as of January 1, 2004, Jérôme
Bindé presented the SHS’s main objectives
and reviewed the goals of the Joint Committee. The projects
presented for the 2004-2005 biennium are mostly tied
to the organization of workshops for the Sydney Congress,
during which the outcome of the various 2002-2003 regional
conferences will be discussed. Africa, Latin America,
Eastern Central Europe and the Arab Muslim countries
will be the topics of workshop sessions. The Committee
also formally noted that workshops might be planned
for the Caribbean and Southeast Asia. The Joint Committee’s
budget must also provide for the publication of the
proceedings of the Bamako conference (1999) and the
annual meetings in 2004 and 2005. Mr. Bindé spoke
of a possible subsidy under the “Dialogue among
Civilizations” program, which has a separate budget.
The Committee agreed to submit a request to that program.
7. Next meeting
The
next Bureau meeting will be held in Sydney on Saturday,
July 2, 2005, at 2 p.m.
8.
Miscellaneous
8.1
Advance of funds
Further to the report of the President of the Organizing
Committee of the Sydney Congress, it was proposed that
the ICHS Treasurer be authorized to immediately transfer
CHF 30,000 to the Australian Organizing Committee, which
represents the budget earmarked in 2003 and 2004 for
the Sydney Congress.
8.2
Nominating Committee
The Nominating Committee was to meet immediately after
the meeting of the Bureau on August 30. The purpose
of the meeting was to replace five members of the Bureau
whose term had expired, i.e. Jürgen Kocka, Romila
Thapar, Eva Österberg, Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch
and Gregory Bongard-Levin. The members of the Bureau
discussed the factors that should govern their choices
for future members and agreed on some points such as
scholarly abilities, organizational skills, networking
ability and the ability to function in one of the official
languages of the ICHS, i.e. French or English. Other
desirable factors would be an adequate distribution
of regions and sexes, and the rotation of countries
represented on the Bureau.
As
there were no more points to discuss, the President
thanked the members of the Bureau and closed the meeting.
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